march language learning goals (+ february review) 🤎
coucou,
for a short month, a lot has happened.
i’m still in germany; in terms of my main living location. moving to 9ja is postponed till further notice. and i don’t have a holiday booked till august. i’m hoping to change that. i need at least one holiday before that; ideally two. but let’s see how that will work out.
in terms of language learning, the french course i signed up for got cancelled because not enough people signed up which is a bummer. also, the dutch course i also signed up for (or at least tried to) was full so i got put on the waitlist. i didn’t get in which is not surprising.
i decided to go for purely preply now. so i subscribed to one french tutor (i’m still actively looking for a second one), two dutch tutors but i alternate them each week so i have one tutor every two weeks, and two yoruba tutors but i have one lesson with each one, once a week. this month will be a trial month just to see how much i can keep up with the lessons and if i’m still satisfied with the tutor and their teaching methodologies. i might drop one, or increase/decrease the amount of lessons i have per week.
my hausa lessons start in april because my tutor (who is not on preply btw) is not teaching during ramadan. speaking on ramadan/lent, i’m fasting too and currently doing the 75 sofr/medium challenge which is low key a double homi but i will speak more about it in my next blog post.
since, me moving to 9ja is postponed, i was thinking about the languages i wanted to start learning this year. because the decision on learning what language, when, is also influenced on where i planned to live for the majority of the time. but i decided against changing the languages i planned on learning.
my current languages:
french (A2)
dutch (A1)
yoruba
here are my february language goals ♡:
maintain a 30 days duolingo streak (completed)
completed the february challenge on duolingo (completed)
watch at least 3 episodes of miraculous in french (netflix) (not completed)
complete lessons 10 - 14 in ‘The Complete French Self-Study Guide’ with notes taking (eBook) (not completed)
watch ‘Learn French in 5 Days # Day 1’ up until ‘Le verbe ‘Attendre’ (3:01:45)’ (youtube) (not fully completed)
finish the 'getting started with french' course (the open university website) (not completed)
watch at least 1 dutch movies (not completed)
re-watch all the alphabet related videos saved in the watch later playlist (youtube) in yoruba and take notes (not completed)
get familiar with all the yoruba language learning apps & delete if not useful (not completed)
watch at least 3 episodes of jenifa’s diary (youtube) (not completed)
watch at least 3 episodes of arole (youtube) (not completed)
watch at least 2 episodes of splendid cartoon (youtube) (not completed)
watch at least 1 yoruba movie (not completed)
create a language learning plan for hausa (completed)
i didn’t get much done which i'm not surprised about. i’m not going to carry most of the uncomplished goals over because of me fasting and hiring tutor(s) for each langauge. as mentioned, as this is a “trial month” with my tutors i will go along with their learning objectives. and see how i can combine it with my own resources as the months go by. and me fasting is messing with my energy levels but i know this will only last for a couple of days till my body gets used to it.
so here are my march language learning goals ♡:
maintain a 30 days duolingo streak
completed the march challenge on duolingo
watch 2 easyfrench & easydutch YouTube videos
watch at least 2 episodes of miraculous in french (netflix)
finish the 'getting started with french' course (the open university website)
watch at least 1 dutch movies
get familiar with all the yoruba language learning apps & delete if not useful
watch at least 2 episodes of jenifa’s diary (youtube)
watch at least 2 episodes of arole (youtube)
watch at least 2 episodes of splendid cartoon (youtube)
Preply, a tutoring service, is advertising on Tumblr now. I've been tutoring with them since May, and I strongly suggest you do NOT find a tutor on Preply. They are an awful company. Here are a few reasons.
1. I am unpaid for the first lesson with every student. Preply takes it all.
2. Preply takes a hefty commission on all other sessions. I charge $15 an hour, and I only make $10.05 because of the commission rate. It also costs 20 cents to transfer funds to PayPal.
3. Preply heavily pushes a subscription model, but most students do not seem to want this. I've had many students who booked a trial lesson and stated they'd like to continue, only to never schedule another lesson again.
4. If there are technical problems during a lesson that cause me to lose connection, then I don't get paid. I was in a session for over 20 minutes out of 60 a month ago when Firefox crashed on me, and I didn't get paid a cent for it, even after logging back into the session ~10 minutes later!
5. Preply support is total ass. A few weeks ago, I had to cancel a trial lesson with a student, and let them know over 24 hours in advance...they said ok and thanked me for the notice.
Then, a week and a half later, they marked me as absent! My profile was hidden and I got some other penalties, too. It took support 6 days to resolve this issue and get the report discarded and my profile unhidden. The only support on Preply is a chat function and an email.
The PFPs in the chat all look AI generated, so take from that what you will.
6. I can only tutor one subject.
7. When you sign up, you can list your languages and your proficiency in each. I listed my Spanish as A2 when I first signed up.
Several months later, after much studying, I tried to change it to B2, but couldn't. Preply support told me I needed a test result to prove I was at B2, and said I could use an online test, so I did and sent a screenshot of my results.
Then I was told that my proficiency level can't be changed unless I take the DELE exam, which I have to pay (and likely travel) to take, and send the results in the support chat...even though I could put in whatever proficiency I wanted when I first signed up.
8. Scammers are common. Every single message I got during the summer months was from a scammer.
9. Unscrupulous homeschool parents are also common. A woman reached out to me asking me to tutor her daughter in history according to Canadian curriculum -- I said sure. Then after the 1st session, she finally was honest and told me that she wanted me to teach an entire history class to her daughter...for $15 ($10.05 due to the commission) once a week Fuck that!
I just got an email from Teachaway advertising English teacher positions on Preply. I’d never heard of it before but it seems to be similar to italki. Anyone have any experience? I feel like the stars are aligning but also I don’t wanna just sign up the teach on a website I know basically nothing about.
¡Hola! Me gustaría mucho ayudarte a conseguir tus objetivos de aprendizaje. Echa un vistazo a mi perfil de Preply y reserva una clase de prueba conmigo:
¡Hola! Mi nombre es Luna y vengo de Argentina. Mis clases de español están dirigidas a estudiantes no hispano parlantes. Vas a encontrar un
